


As From A Chrysalis

by amorremanet



Series: the Chrysalis 'verse [1]
Category: Supernatural RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Angst, Anxiety Disorder, Body Image, Catholic School, Clothing Kink, Community: chubwinchesters, Community: hc_bingo, Fat Character, Food Issues, Humiliation, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, POV Alternating, Panic Attack, School Uniforms, Situational Humiliation, Verbal Humiliation, Weighing/Measuring, Weight Gain, chubby!Misha, chubby!kink, fat appreciation, numbers!kink
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-11
Updated: 2012-11-11
Packaged: 2017-11-18 09:49:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,714
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/559643
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amorremanet/pseuds/amorremanet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jensen is absolutely, totally not checking Misha out, because Misha is his best friend and that would be really awkward. Misha doesn't believe that Jensen would ever look at him, anyway.</p>
            </blockquote>





	As From A Chrysalis

**Author's Note:**

> This was written, first and foremost, for the current [dice meme](http://chubwinchesters.livejournal.com/125936.html) at ~chubwinchesters, with the roll of 3-3-2-6-6, which gave me the prompt: "Castiel/Misha; Button popping, weighing and/or measuring, humiliation, self-consciousness; weight of 266 pounds, or 140 pounds gained." I tried to work in as many of the trope prompts as possible, because I'm a creature made of pure, unmitigated evil (and a little bit of caffeine).
> 
> This was also written for the prompts, "humiliation" at ~hc_bingo, and "indiscretion" for 100 things ([reference prompts](http://amor-remanet.livejournal.com/560177.html)).

Jensen finally hits a proper growth spurt in the summer before their junior year at Saint Sebastian's Academy.

He's been building up to it for a while, and by August, he's gone from five-foot-nine to six-foot-one—on top of that, the diet that Momma and Doctor Roberts put him on takes pretty well and Jensen drops a good thirty-five pounds. At his annual physical at the beginning of August, he's lean and lanky, down to one-seventy, and his and Jared's cousin, Danneel, says it's like watching a butterfly emerge from its chubby chrysalis, upon seeing Jensen in the new uniform he has to buy for school. Jensen's never itched so much to go back to classes—he's even missing Sister Mary Ignatius and how severe she gets about everything under the sun.

"Yeah, that's great for you," Misha says with a sigh, looking himself over in his bedroom's full-length mirror. "But _some_ of us are pretty well done growing, and _some_ of us don't have diets that work, and _some_ of us are just gonna end up going back to even more reminders of how fucking fat we are. Because it's totally plausible that we could ever fucking _forget_ that we're too big to be allowed."

Jared's flopped out on his own pudgy stomach, stretched to his full flab-bound, six-foot-five on Misha's bed and reading _The Hunger Games_ for the umpteenth fucking time—but he looks up from his weathered paperback to hiss at Jensen, "He means himself."

To which Jensen rolls his eyes because no, really? _Duh_ , of course Misha's talking about himself—Jensen's not stupid just because he's kind of blonde, Jay. It's not like he'd be talking about Jared—who's nerdy and chubby (or even outright fat, since he's got a hundred-twenty pounds on Jensen, as of his own physical), who's a social outcast, who's deemed socially unacceptable for the same reasons that Misha is and Jensen was, but doesn't let the insults get to him in the same way that Misha does—and Misha obviously can't be talking about Jensen, since he's gone and gotten pretty thin this summer. Simple process of elimination logic says that no shit, Sherlock, Misha's talking about Misha right now.

Jared shrugs and keeps his voice low as he tells Jensen, "Now would be a good time for you to say go and something encouraging instead of just blatantly checking him out, Prince Charming."

Which would be great advice if Jensen were checking Misha out, but he isn't. He's not checking Misha out because Misha's only been his best friend since kindergarten. Because it'd be really awkward for Jensen to take note of how Misha's definitely gotten thicker in the hips and ass and thighs this summer, or how his ass strains the seams of his shorts, or how it looks, in the reflection, like Misha's double-chin's gotten just a bit more pronounced.

At least, it'd be awkward for Jensen to take not of those things because he's into Misha and thinking about asking him out or some crazy thing like that. Jensen's just taking note of these things because, as Misha's best friend, it's his right to be concerned. Especially when Misha definitely looks concerned himself—best friends get concerned about each other. It's, like, the rules or something. Everybody fucking knows that.

Not that Misha's weight really needs anybody to get concerned about it, if anyone asks Jensen, which no one has, but that's beside the point. It's just that Misha's always been kinda chunky. At least, he has been as far back as Jensen can remember. Sure, there's photo evidence of Misha being pretty skinny in kindergarten and first grade, back when Jensen still had a lot of stock and puppy fat about him, but Misha started putting on weight soon after that and he hasn't really stopped.

Supposedly, he's been dieting along with Jensen this summer, but unlike Jensen, Misha's let Jared talk him into cheating here and splurging there and packing away the sweets while they marathon-watched shitty movies instead of going for a run, and the results of this—the toll it's all taken on Misha's waistline and his pear-shaped hips—show themselves off all the more when Misha turns to the side, runs his pudgy fingers down the pooch and curve of his soft, chubby belly.

This angle gives Jensen so much more to ogle, too—or at least, it would if he were ogling Misha, which he still isn't. He can see from here that there's definitely a bit more to Misha's chin—and he's definitely not thinking about biting it—and he has the best view he can think of when Misha manhandles his muffin-top, pinches at the jelly rolls along his side, palms at his front and jostles his stomach around.

Even through his strained, thinning t-shirt, Jensen can clearly make out the way that Misha's flesh jiggles—and he finds himself sucking in a deep breath, biting on his lower lip, feeling something hot blooming along the back of his neck—and Jensen has no idea why that is. It's not like Misha's _that_ much bigger than he's ever been before. Sure, he's put on weight this summer, but not _that_ much—and even if he had, Jensen's seen Misha's tummy tons of times. He's seen Misha's jiggle tons of times. There's no reason at all for Jensen to think or feel anything different—

Except for a desire to punch Jared in the mouth, and that's just because Jared kicks him in the side first.

"Hey! _Ow!_ " Jensen hisses, glaring down at Jared, who just smirks like he's a perfect fucking angel with no idea what Jensen's talking about, complaining about pain—and when Jensen looks back up, Misha's turned all the way around. He's facing Jensen as much as he can while he's looking at his feet—or at his belly, maybe. Can Misha even still see his feet? Jensen wants to bet that he can't, and that thought makes something hot shock straight down his spine and into his stomach, where it sets about unfurling and twisting around—but it's not lust. Definitely not. That'd be silly.

Jensen starts trying to apologize for staring, but Misha cuts him off: "You don't need to say anything, Jen," he says, voice soft and almost timid. "I already know I totally let you down as a diet-buddy. I suck at keeping on it, I hate going out on runs, I never kept up with the weigh-ins we were supposed to have… And now, I've let myself go and get all… bulging and gross and shit while you got skinny? You can totally tell me it's my fault, you know. Because we all know that it _is_."

"It's not like it's _all_ your fault," Jensen says through a sigh, and immediately hates the way that this came out. "I mean—okay, that came out kind of douchey—what I meant to say is, most of it's probably not your fault at all? Or all of it? I mean, your mom knew you were trying to get on a diet and she still made you help her bake shit for all those dumb fundraiser things, right? Like, excuse me, but how the Hell is that even fair? It's not, that's how. Besides, skinny's nice, but it's totally overrated. I'm, like, two steps from a strong breeze being to knock me on my ass—and I probably couldn't knock Chad's teeth in anymore if I _tried_."

Misha's smile is kind of tiny and wobbly, but at least it's there—not that this stops him from turning back to the mirror, or from moving his shorts' waistband down underneath his belly so he can quote, "assess the problem more efficiently" unquote, or from whining about how disgusting he thinks his body is. And the worst part isn't even any of that. It's that Jensen can't even control his thick, stupid, tied-up tongue enough to tell his best friend that he looks really cute and about the exact opposite of disgusting. There's pretty much no way to say it without sounding like he wants to get Misha in bed or ask him to Homecoming or thousands of other things that Jensen in no way whatsoever wants to do.

Except for the fact that, judging by how he gets hard from watching Misha manhandle himself, Jensen just might really want to do these things and more.

**********

At the beginning of the summer, back when he was supposed to be getting on a diet with Jensen, Misha weighed in at a full two-hundred-and-forty pounds and he had a forty-seven-and-a-half-inch waist.

It set his head spinning, to see the number on the scale and the number on the tape-measure—he'd weighed two-fifteen at his last physical, he'd only had a forty-two-inch waist then, and he knew that he'd gone and gained a considerable amount of weight in the past several months, but he hadn't even considered that he'd let himself pack on a good, solid twenty-five pounds, that he had thirty-five pounds on than his best friend, that he was only fifty pounds off from meeting Jared's two-ninety and without the thyroid condition that explains why Jared's as fat as he is… Misha hadn't thought he'd ever let his weight get higher than two-twenty-five.

Misha's grateful that Jensen's told no one about that weigh-in session, because he still remembers the way he cried, the way he shed his hot, sick tears and blubbered like a baby over letting himself get so plump. And he managed to diet for a good three days—but that's when everything fell apart, when his Mom needed an extra set of hands in the kitchen and when Misha wound up getting so sick with himself for eating two of her brownies that, before he knew what was what, he'd packed away three glasses of milk, two huge slices of Mom's homemade triple-layer fudge cake, and a package-and-a-half of double-stuffed Oreos. He downed two packs of Reese's peanut butter cups on top of that before he made himself stop.

And everything was all just a downward spiral from there—he knows he's gained even more weight before he even steps on Doctor Roberts's scale for his physical, but Misha's unprepared for just how much. He's unprepared for everything about how big he's gotten.

Afterward, when Misha meets Jensen at the Sunny Side Of The Street Diner for lunch, three weeks before they're due to return to school and to classes, he feels ready to cry again, and for all he knows that he shouldn't do this, he orders a small feast for himself. Mozzarella sticks and chicken fingers off the appetizer menu, a huge triple-thick chocolate milkshake, a bacon double-cheeseburger with extra cheese and a fried egg on top, extra fries, and a Coke—Misha practically inhales everything that his older cousin, Genevieve, sets down in front of him, even the second milkshake, and by the time he's done with his lunch, Misha's still hungry.

He shouldn't be hungry still—he really, _really_ shouldn't be, and he definitely shouldn't indulge himself any more—but he is, so to top off everything else, he orders a super-sized brownie sundae for dessert.

All Jensen's had during lunch has been a dinner-sized Caesar salad with grilled chicken on it, and he's been eating it painfully slowly. Genevieve even brings two spoons for the sundae, but Jensen doesn't want any, so Misha's left to devour it on his own—just like he planned on doing in the first place. He shouldn't enjoy the heaping scoops of vanilla ice cream as much as he does—he shouldn't enjoy the two, huge, warm chocolate chip brownies or the hot fudge, either—he really doesn't need to enjoy the two extra scoops of mint chocolate chip that Genevieve snuck onto Misha's sundae because she knows it's his favorite kind of ice cream…

He could just kill her for going and doing that to him, especially when she _knows_ that he's supposed to be on a diet, when _she's_ the one who's always calling him Tubby and Butterball and joking around about his weight problem.

Seriously. About the last thing that Misha and his so-called diet need is any of what he's eaten today, and more than anything else, he doesn't need this fucking sundae. It'll just make him get fatter and more disgusting—which he doesn't need all the more, just considering how long it took him to wriggle into his jeans before his doctor's appointment, how he could barely get them up over his chunky, jiggling thighs, how he needed to fasten them underneath his belly before he could even dream about tugging the waistband up to where it belongs, how much bigger and softer his muffin-top's gotten in the past few months…

With how much weight Doctor Roberts's scale says he's gained, Misha shouldn't be so surprised that none of his clothes fit anymore—they were tight enough on him before he totally failed on this summer's diet—but he still can't believe how much his waistband's cutting into his paunch. It just seems unfathomable—he's been chubby for so long, but he's never been this big before, and the more he eats, the bigger he gets—both from gaining weight in the longterm and bloating in the short. It's simple math that should stop him from shoveling food into his mouth, but Misha can't make himself stop—he wants to, but he doesn't and he's still so hungry…

Mom and Dad won't say it, and Misha's older sister Vicki won't say it, and Genevieve won't say it, and Jensen and Jared won't say it, and Doctor Ferris, Misha's shrink, won't say it—but it's pretty fucking obvious that Misha's gone and let himself go. That he's stopped being just chubby and started just getting outright fat. That he _needs_ to just stop eating already if he doesn't want to be the size of a house by graduation or even before then. At the rate he's going, he'll break three-hundred pounds before he knows what's hit him.

But Misha still moans as he wraps his lips around his spoon, as he shovels heap after heap of calories and fat and sugar into his mouth. His jeans slice harder into his flesh than normal and his stomach's pushing his t-shirt up over the deep hollow of his bellybutton, but he just keeps eating. Shudders, all warm and deep, from how good everything tastes in his mouth—the warm, thick softness of the brownie and the hot fudge; the smooth, cold ice cream melting up into a mix of sweetness and different textures… Besides, it'd be a waste of food if Misha stopped now, and he can't do that. He made this bed by ordering himself a sundae, so he just has to sleep in it like an adult.

More than once, Misha has to drop his hand to his middle and knead at his flesh just to keep on eating—his stomach only hurts a little, but he's certain that he's going to burst, if not from how much he's eaten in this one sitting, then definitely from the hot, sick feeling bubbling up in his stomach, clawing its way up his spine, rising to his cheeks and setting the whole back of his neck on fire…

If the food doesn't get Misha, then the shame of eating it all—the shame of knowing that he doesn't have the self-control to keep a stupid diet, the shame of his belly edging out to nuzzle up against his thighs, the shame of knowing that Jensen's been sitting here this whole time, watching him make a fucking pig of himself? All of that will get to Misha instead and make him blow up in some explosion of flab and utter humiliation.

Or just make him blow up in the way where he gets fatter—either way, it's terrible for Misha and he just keeps eating anyway. Stuffing himself until he feels better, until warm contentment washes over him—it hasn't worked yet, but it's worked before, so it _should_ get him feeling less like he wants to curl up in a hole and die.

"So when's the part where you talk to me about whatever's going on in that head of yours instead of just bullshitting about Doctor Who?" Jensen says after a while, when Misha's about halfway through his sundae. "And don't even try to tell me that there's nothing up with you right now, Meesh. You saw the Doctor, now you're trying to bury yourself in food and you won't hardly talk to me. It's pretty obvious that something's going on."

"I don't wanna talk about it," Misha mutters and chows down on another spoonful of ice cream and brownie.

Then, because he's still upset, he has another bite, and another one on top of that, and another still—he practically gets the remaining half of his sundae vacuumed up into his stuffed belly. Then he heaves a deep breath, sucking in his belly as he does so, sighing as he lets it go… _Rrrrip! snap! ping!_ —Misha's sigh turns so much deeper, so much more relieved than he intended, as his stomach surges forward, flops out further onto his legs, pushes the flaps of his jeans apart and crunches the flaps down underneath his bulk. Oh, God… Misha gasps, which just makes his belly jut out further, and Jensen leans down underneath the table.

When he comes up, he's holding a button—it must be the button from Misha's jeans. Something hot spills out all in the pool of his stomach, worms up and around into his muscles, and yanks Misha's heart down into his gut, sets his head spinning as his whole face and neck start getting warm.

Before he even knows what's what, Misha full-on flushes, hot and scarlet, swallows thickly and reaches down to feel for where his jeans should meet. All he feels is the warm, pudgy underside of his belly spilling out into his lap like it damn well _belongs_ there—he fingers around a bit, finds the hole and the rent fabric where the button came off, grabs onto the underside of his belly, underneath the dip around his waist… _Oh, God. Oh, God. Oh, **God**_ …

Misha whines more than he wants to admit, ducks his chin (feels the pudge underneath it billow out as his eyes start to sting), catches a glimpse of how far his tummy's pushed his t-shirt up and struggles in vain to yank it down—but it won't budge, and when he makes the smallest bit of headway, it just nudges his t-shirt back up. It even feels like it's gone up further. He feels more skin underneath his straining hemline and more supple flab to sink his fingers into, more of the angry stretch marks that stripe his middle—no, no, no, no, no. He can't be this big, he can't have let himself get so fat, Misha just can't have let himself go so badly, he just can't have… This cannot be happening to him. He can't have gotten this fucking _fat_.

And yet, he has. All his clothes are too small for him, he knew that when he woke up today, but he can't be so gross, he can't have let himself turn into such a bloated little land-whale, he'll never be able to lose weight enough to fit in these jeans again, much less get skinny like Jensen, the way Misha wants to be… His eyes sting harder as tears start welling up, and his breath comes shorter, and shorter, and shorter—Misha tries to get deeper breaths, but all that does is make his _stupid, fat belly_ flop even further into his lap when he exhales. Head spinning harder, he doesn't get a proper breath at all until Jensen scoots into his side of the booth and curls an arm around his shoulder. Misha whines again, half-whimpering as he turns and curls into Jensen's side.

"Eighteen pounds, Jen," Misha admits before Jensen can even ask anything, just so Jensen won't have that chance. He keeps his voice barely above a whisper, just so no one else can listen in on their talk, so no one can hear him sniffling like a baby. "I put on eighteen pounds this summer, Jen… I'm up to two-fifty-eight, and I know I need to go on a diet but I just get so _hungry_ , I can't even think straight, so I just fall apart… Go ahead. Tell me I'm gross, and fat, and disgusting. Everybody's thinking it anyway, it's okay for you to say it."

"Well, I must not count as 'everybody' then," Jensen says with a sigh, "because I'm not thinking you're disgusting. Because you're not. You're not even that fat—I mean… okay, yeah, you're kind of chunky, but you're _not_ that fat—and even if you were, it wouldn't mean that you're any less awesome, okay?"

It's all a lie. Sure, it's a really nice lie, and Misha appreciates that Jensen tells it to him—he appreciates that it gets his breathing to even out; he appreciates it almost as much as he appreciates Jensen loaning him a jacket to cover up with when they leave the diner—but that doesn't change the fact that it's a _lie_. Misha really is that fat, and once they get out to Jensen's car, he swears on his life that he's going to lose all the weight he's gained and more. He's going on a diet, for real this time, the way that Doctor Roberts has suggested he do since he was thirteen and first weighed in at over two-hundred pounds.

And no one's going to stop Misha until he's gotten his weight down to somewhere more acceptable—somewhere he can be skinny like Jensen. It might be a good hundred pounds off, or so, but Misha won't let that get in his way. He just won't. 

**********

Misha's renewed diet never comes, or if it does, then it really, really doesn't work. Jensen doesn't see any proof of it working, anyway. Aside from that, Misha's mom keeps dragging him into baking things with her, and Jared keeps making Misha play his shitty rom-com buddy, and even if Misha were any good at keeping a diet on his own, he'd be pretty well screwed by his total inability to say, "no" to the people he cares about. That whole cluster-fuck trips him up every single time it crosses his path, and by the first day of school, the biggest change in Jensen's best friend is that, Misha's gone and bought some clothes that actually fit him, a uniform that isn't clinging to his skin, that he isn't in some serious danger of ripping in two or busting out of.

Not that he really had any other choice. The nuns at Saint Sebastian's get on everybody's case about everything—with how they harass the girls for blouses that fit too snugly, there's no way that Misha and his uniform from last year would be safe from getting heckled. Even before summer break, he got reminded that his buttons all strained too much around his middle, reminded that he couldn't tuck in his shirt anymore because it rode up on him so much, reminded that he had to do up his trousers underneath his swollen, pudgy belly because his waist had gotten too thick to fit into them, reminded that torn-off buttons did not reflect well on his appearance or his spiritual purity. Reminded, in so many words, of just how chubby he'd gotten—and it'd have to be even worse than that, now that he's gained more weight on top of what he put on last term.

As it stands, his new uniform doesn't do that much to slim Misha down (by appearances, anyway). When Jensen and Jared pick him up for school on Monday, Misha's got his pleated gray trousers done up and belted underneath the soft-looking, sagging expanse of his under-belly, which it looks like he's only barely gotten squeezed into his shirt. Must be something about the fabric and how it's white, though, because the buttons don't strain to hold him in—the fabric's just kind of thin, and kind of clingy, so it hugs to the curves of Misha's stomach, making him look chubbier. His hips round out like a girl's, noticeably wider than the rest of him, and when Misha turns to pick up his backpack, Jensen's mouth goes dry, just from watching the way his ass fills out the seat of his pants. Jensen only comes back around because Jared thwacks him in the shoulder, snickering.

"What the Hell are you doing," Jensen hisses, glaring daggers into the backseat, thinking he could just throttle Jared, if he could manage to get his hands around his favorite cousin's chunky neck. If he had the strength to manage choking the bastard.

"You were checking him out again," Jared says and shrugs. "That's really not conducive to your ability to drive a car, and I kind of like being alive, so… Seemed like a good idea to drag you out of fantasizing about Misha's ass and all the things you want to do to it."

Jensen flushes bright pink and insists that he doesn't want to do anything to Misha's ass—but Jared just uses his fingers to mime a dick going into a hole in the rearview mirror, giggling like an idiot as he does so. He doesn't get any better as the day goes on—and the worst part isn't even that Jared won't shut up and quit insinuating all kinds of things about Jensen having a crush on his best friend. No, no—that'd be too easy for it to be part of Jensen's life. As the day goes on and Jensen has to suffer through classes with the two of them—with Misha squirming uncomfortably when anyone so much as looks at him and with Jared making his little sign language sex motions every time Jensen's the person looking at Misha—with girls coming over between classes and during lunch, twirl their hair around their fingers as they ask Jensen how his summer was, how he's liking his classes so far, what he's doing next weekend…

As Jensen drags himself through all of that, the worst part gets looking like he really can't deny what Jared's saying.

It's not awkward, not yet—mostly because Misha doesn't know about it, so he can't totally fail to reciprocate—but there is definitely An Issue with how Jensen can't deny Jared's whole rap of _you have a crush on your best friend and you want to fuck him into the mattress, deal with it_. Not even because of the rap itself, but because once the thought that Jensen might actually have a crush on Misha wanders into his head, Jensen can't hardly think about anything else—he goes from zero to lovesick moron in what feels like ten seconds flat. In the middle of English class, Jensen finds himself doodling what ends up being a little cartoon of Misha eating a cupcake, surrounded by little cartoon hearts. In the middle of Advanced Algebra—which Jensen has alone, because Misha's already in Pre-Calc and Jared's repeating Geometry—Jensen ends up sketching a better picture of Misha, one that he more seriously pursues, and on better paper, when he has his Art elective with Sister Mary Constance.

In between the rounds of visits from girls at lunch, Jensen barely manages to eat his turkey sandwich and salad. He keeps zoning out, just listening to Misha and Jared argue about the hypothetical Justice League movie, just watching Misha while he eats. Jensen tries, but he can't take his eyes off of Misha's mouth, can't stop watching Misha stretch his lips around his forkfuls of his Mom's twice-baked macaroni and cheese, can't stop thinking that he could find so many different, better uses for the capacity of Misha's mouth and wondering if Misha has a gag reflex—which makes Jensen blush and try to bury his face in his thermos of water, just because it's such a shitty thing to think about his best friend. It's objectifying, and it's gross, and seriously, why the Hell is he thinking this about _Misha_? They're practically brothers—worse than that, if Misha would just notice Jensen staring at him, he'd probably get hurt and a little offended. He'd probably think Jensen was watching him put away that slice of cake because of how big he's gotten.

And maybe Jensen's no expert about this stuff—maybe he's never dated anybody, not least because Sister Mary Ignatius and her ruler waste so much time telling him that homosexuals are inherently immoral and Jensen would get probably expelled for trying to take another guy to prom—but he's pretty sure that accidentally hurting Misha's feelings wouldn't be the best prelude to asking him what he's up to on Saturday night and if he wants to go to the movies.

Jared's advice on the situation is so simple that Jensen could just kick something, and it comes after they drop Misha off at home. Usually, the three of them would all study and do homework together, but it's the last night that Misha has with Vicki before she goes back to college for her own new semester, so of course he wants to spend time with her. Which Jensen minds a little, but not enough to make a huge fuss about—especially not when he _needs_ some privacy so he can ask somebody what the Hell he's supposed to _do_ about having a crush on Misha. Even if the only person available is Jared. Even if this is one of the least ideal situations that Jensen can think of. Even if Jared just topples back on the bed and laughs at him, right off the bat—Jensen still has to ask someone to help him out.

"Sometimes, I don't know how you two would ever survive without me," Jared says, once he starts recovering, sitting up and slumping back into Jensen's headboard. "No, seriously, Jen. I'm kinda wondering if the fat you lost went into your fucking head, because you are the most oblivious person I've ever met. …Except for maybe Misha, who's well up a certain Egyptian river about: a. the crush you have on him, and b. the crush he has on you."

"Wait a minute," Jensen spits out and flops onto the foot of his bed. He pulls his legs up onto the mattress with him and glares at Jared. "Since when does Misha have a crush on me, too?"

"Only since, like, third grade or something. He probably started falling for you that time he ripped his jeans on that field trip to the zoo and you beat Chad up for being a dick and laughing at him. And he has this thing where he thinks you can't be into him because he's on the chubby side." Jared rolls his eyes and shrugs as if to say, _duh, how could you not just know this already, Smartypants_. "Anyway, the point here is? You two are making a whole big messy deal out of something that doesn't need a whole, big messy deal made out of it, okay?"

"Okay? …What the Hell does that even mean?" All the words make sense enough on their own, and they come together perfectly fine as a sentence—but the idea of it all's still lost on Jensen. All he can think is that it's easy enough for Jared to say they're making much ado about nothing— _he's_ not the one who's stuck in the middle of it and could possibly lose his best friend if something—if _anything_ —about this goes any kind of wrong.

But still, he sighs, and shrugs again, and shakes his head in pity as he says, "All it means, Jenny, is that this whole thing is really, really simple. You and Misha both like each other. The only thing getting in the way is that neither of you's come out and said so yet. All you have to do to is tell him that you're into him—and if he starts stinking up a fuss about how he's blah blah fat, yadda yadda undesirable, peas and carrots you could do so much better than the likes of him, what about blonde Kat, or brunette Kat, or Clea, or Katie, or Natasha, or Adrianne—you know what you do then?"

"Tell him I'm gay and have to listen to him tell me I should go date Tom, or Mike, or Aldis, or Jeff, or Gabe, or Julian, or Tall Mark, or British Mark, or who-the-fuck-ever else he thinks I might like instead of him?"

Smirking, Jared leans over and flicks Jensen on the nose like he's a disobedient puppy or some shit like that. "No, Prince Charming," he says. "If Misha starts raising a fuss about how much better he thinks you could do? You grab him by the shirt, you pull him in close, and you kiss him like your life depends on it. Kiss him like you're gonna get turned into a frog forever if you don't. Kiss him and show the little fuck-head that you're not joking around about being into him since forever."

Jensen blinks at Jared for a long moment. Doesn't even have the energy to roll his eyes at the utter bullshit that he's hearing. "You and Misha have been watching way too many rom-coms and Disney movies. It's starting to addle your big, stupid brain." And Jensen shudders to think about what it might've done to Misha.

"Maybe so, but it doesn't mean that I'm not right. Or that he wouldn't find the gesture suitably romantic and endearing and shit. Try it out first before you just flat out tell me I'm wrong."

Sometimes, Jensen loves his family. Sometimes, he's perfectly happy to be a member of Clan Ackles-Harris-Padalecki. And other times—like right now, for instance—he could seriously punch God in the throat for sticking him with these crazy people. Or maybe it's just that he wants to smack Jared a little bit and go beg Danneel for advice instead. At least she'd be slightly less obnoxious about the whole thing.

**********

Thursday is the worst day of the week for one very painfully simple reason: Misha, Jensen, and Jared have gym class.

Worse than that, he has it with Coach Wilcox, the biggest hard-ass on the Saint Sebastian's phys ed staff. At least the girls get to have their class with Sister Mary Aloysius, the co-ed track team's coach and Misha's AP European History teacher (and his teacher for last year's American History class), who's on the young side among the Sisters, and really sweet especially for a nun, and almost compulsively understanding of her students' flaws and myriad life crises. She's one of the only teachers who's ever stood up for Misha when Chad and Steve and other kids call him Tubby, and Two-Ton, and Fat-Ass, and Lard-Butt, and Chunky, and every other asinine, weight-related nickname that they can think of.

Coach Wilcox, on the other hand, has a history of encouraging that kind of behavior—Hell, when Misha's weight started really climbing up there last term and his gym uniform stopped fitting him, Wilcox used to call him Blubber-Butt during class and he hurled insults like, _come on, Chunky, or are you getting tripped up on your freaking thunder-thighs_ and, _hey, hey, hey, Chubby Bunny, you getting tired, maybe you should try harder in my class instead of stuffing your fat little chipmunk cheeks_ at Misha as he forced himself through the mid-semester mile run. He's in stunning form today, too, arching an eyebrow and chuckling at Misha as he makes all the guys line up alphabetically by their last names, as he snaps that they have a special assignment to start off the new semester.

"Someone on the Academy's Board of Directors has decided that their new pet cause this year is going to be—" Coach snickers, pausing in front of Misha and smirking like the edge of a knife… "Childhood _obesity_."

He snaps his fingers in front of Misha's face, makes Misha startle, jump. With a heavy faux-sigh, Coach picks up where he left off in his pacing. "So, our term-long project is going to be getting you pudgy, flab-infested pigs into shape. We're going to be weighing you all in and taking measurements today, then keeping track of your body fat throughout the semester to make sure that everybody's healthy. Whosoever has an unacceptable amount of body fat—that is, anybody who's got more than twenty-five percent body fat? Well, he's just going to go and add an extra after-school session of my class to your Wednesday repertoires. And to start us off? Let's get Aaronson up here, front and center!"

Misha wanted to be happy that they weren't going to actually do anything physical today—but a weigh-in? In front of all these people? Even though he can still curl up in the thought that he might've lost weight in the nigh-on four weeks since he saw Doctor Roberts, Misha's heart plummets into his stomach, down into the pit of it, where something hot's spilling out all over again, digging its talons into Misha's insides and making him regret not faking sick to get out of this shit, or not having a thyroid problem like Jared, so he'd have an excuse not to feel ashamed of his weight. Because it'd be out of his control and not his fault in the first place.

All his muscles writhe around in preemptive shame as Gregory Aaronson, star forward on the boys' soccer team, jogs up to Coach Wilcox, toes out of his sneakers, and starts showing off how the whole process works. Aaronson is a full six-foot-three, according to the poster on the wall by the entrance to Coach's office. He hops up on the scale and Wilcox announces for the entire room that he weighs a good hundred-eighty pounds. He smirks over at Misha as he tugs his shirt up, flashing his pale, perfect abs for the rest of the class, lets Coach wrap a tape-measure tight around his thirty-inch waist. Aaronson shrugs when Coach digs the calipers into the only roll of fat he can find on Aaronson's middle, praises his eight-and-a-half percent body fat—and Misha just wants to curl up in a hole and die.

When everything's done, Aaronson scribbles his weight and measurements on the clipboard hanging on Coach's office door—and Jensen's up next, because Misha needed further reminders that he seriously let his best friend down this summer. As if it weren't bad enough that Jensen spent Tuesday at try-outs for the soccer team—as if it weren't awful enough that he made it on while Misha's still too fat to be allowed anywhere—Jensen's standing six-foot-one and he only weighs in at one-sixty-six. When Coach takes his measurements, it turns out that Jensen's whittled his waist down to twenty-seven inches, that his body's weight is only two-and-a-half percent fat. Jensen only barely has four pounds of fat on his new, lanky body, according to Coach's calculator—which is all the more reason why Jared's full of shit whenever he's said that Jensen is into Misha.

As Coach puts it, "Seriously, Ackles—here I thought you'd be in the Chub Club with Collins and Padalecki, but good for you. You could even stand to eat a bit of cake—you know, as long as you run a few laps afterward. Don't go losing any more weight, though, or we'll have a problem."

Jensen's thin enough that people will seriously start to worry about him having an eating disorder if he doesn't stop losing weight—and vaguely, Misha feels like a terrible friend for never thinking that such a thing might happen to them. On the other hand, Misha is a blubber-bound fatty mc-fat-ass. There's no way in Hell that Jensen was ever into Misha as anything more than friends—and it's got to be so much worse, now that Jensen's skinny and Misha's fatter than ever. There's no way that he'd want a boyfriend with cushier hips than all the girls in their class, who has to keep tugging the hem of his standard-issue _Saint Sebastian Arrows_ t-shirt down because it rides up too high on his plump, round, enormous, _squishy_ belly.

Beaming, Jensen goes to scribble down his results, looks over at Misha with a smile that makes Misha feel two-and-a-half inches tall—he wilts, slouching at the hips, not least because he's got to be the worst best friend in the world, just obsessing about his own shit when he should be happy for Jensen. Misha tries to smile back, but it comes out wobbly and half-hearted—he doesn't even need to see his reflection to know that he must look some kind of mess; he sees it spelled out all over the way that Jensen frowns at him, wrinkling his brow and his nose in… concern? Confusion? Some other option that Misha can't even begin to fathom because he's too obsessed with how there are only three more guys ahead of him in the line? Three more guys before Misha Collins fucking dies.

They go by unfairly fast, at that. Every second ticks by at a ponderous pace, scratching hard at the back of Misha's flushed neck—and yet, Coach still seems to breeze through Avon, Borbely, and Brewster—out of nowhere, he's barking, "Collins! Come on, Tubby, get your blubber-butt up here, front and center, you don't get a free pass on this just because everybody already knows you're gonna be seeing me on Wednesdays."

Misha heaves a sigh and trudges forward, has to force himself to stand up straight as he measures five-foot-eleven. He hasn't grown any more—he's probably never going to again, either; Misha got his all growth spurts done in middle school—but on the other hand, Misha's clothes don't fit him any tighter than they did when he got them. At least, none of them feel any tighter on him—that means that he can't have gained any weight since he saw Doctor Roberts, and he knows he could have been dieting better, but he might've even lost weight. Maybe—Misha can hope that he's lost weight, can't he? Of course he can. There's no evidence to say that he's gained weight, instead—he might've lost a little bit.

He tries to ignore the shiver that he gets from Coach arching an eyebrow down at him, the way that his entire body goes cold, then flushes hot with embarrassment when Coach scoffs. Misha sighs. Heaves a deep breath and sucks in his stomach. He holds his breath and climbs up on the scale… and he lets out a whimper as he stares down at the black digital numbers on the screen: _266_. Misha's breath catches in his throat and his mouth falls open—his stomach ties itself up in hot, sick knots, twisting itself around and yanking like it wants to drop out of him and hit the fucking floor—he drops his hands to the hem of his t-shirt as though, somehow, he might be able to hold his belly back and make it look less obnoxious, less prominent, less self-insistent—and all the while, a hot flush claws its way up onto his cheeks and the back of his neck.

Misha fingers tremble as he fumbles with his t-shirt's hem, struggles to yank it down past his waist—he shivers and tries to think about anything but how much he wants to disappear into a crack in the earth that needs to hurry up and open so he can fall into it already. Fifty-one pounds. He's gained fifty-one pounds in the past year. He's got tiger stripes of stretch-marks and everything about him's absolutely inflated and his head's spinning all over again, leaving him dizzy and breathless and just wondering how he ever got so big… He's not even a whole thirty pounds off from how much Jared weighs anymore. He's the very picture of what's wrong with this school and with student health, in the Board of Directors' eyes—he's probably the whole reason why they're making Coach subject the students to this ridiculous stunt in the name of promoting healthier habits.

When Misha doesn't just hop off the scale, Coach leans over, lets out a low whistle and a barking laugh. "Two-sixty-six, Collins?" he snaps, jerks Misha down off the scale by his elbow. His teeth, when he grins down at Misha, all glint like a shark's. "Well, I knew that you were a fatty, fatty, two-by-four," Coach says, snickering, "but I never would've guessed you'd weigh in at two- _hundred_ and _sixty. **six**._ freaking _pounds_. What'd you go and do this summer, Lard-Ass? Put on all the weight that Ackles lost?"

Misha shakes his head, can't manage to say anything and barely manages to climb down off the scale. He glances over to Jensen—mostly by accident, and not for very long, but it's still enough to see that Jensen's gone pale, started gaping at the scene unfolding before him, probably at Misha. Jensen probably never thought that Misha would let himself get so big, either—Jensen's had faith in him this whole time, and Misha's just about spit in his face. Blushing scarlet, feeling his skin and muscles crawl, Misha ducks his double-chin, tries to ignore the way his facial pudge makes itself that much more noticeable. He tries not to think about the words _chubby_ and _fat_ —he tries to pretend that he's somewhere else—anywhere else—but before he can even let himself zone out, Misha gets hung up on one simple fact: looking down at the floor, he can't see his feet anymore. His belly's too big and it gets in the way.

He closes his eyes as he starts peeling his shirt up so Coach can measure his waist, measure how much body fat he has, and Misha wilts that much more when he makes the announcements: Misha's waist clocks in at a full fifty-four inches and, according to the cold metal of Coach's calipers, forty-point-five percent of his body's composed of fat. That's a hundred-and-eight pounds of fat all over Misha's body—and he could easily stand to lose at least a hundred of those. He could probably lose at least a hundred-and-five without making himself all that unhealthy.

"And with that, we have our first visitor for my special Wednesday weight management sessions." Coach cackles, pocketing the calipers and that damned calculator—only to whip out the measuring-tape again. "I know I haven't been measuring anybody else's hips, Collins—but it's a special part of the procedure for all of you who end up in my Wednesday sessions. We need to get us a fix on your waist-to-hip ratio."

When Coach gets done and bids Misha go, he wanders off in a daze. He's still in that daze as he scribbles down his obscene weight, as he scribbles down the _54"_ for his waist's measurement and the _60"_ for his hips'—and that daze only fades when Misha tries to take his space in line again, when he hears someone else hiss at him, _Thunder-Thighs_. Misha's whole face flushes hot, and as he excuses himself, stumbles off toward the locker-room, his mind starts looping that insult, playing it over and over and over again, to the sickening thump of his heart: _Thunder-thighs. Thunder-thighs. Thunder-thighs._

**********

"Misha?" Jensen calls as he finally ducks into the locker-room. "Misha, you in here?"

"Go _away_ ," comes the meek, wobbling, miserable reply—and yeah, right, like Jensen's going to let that slide. Like he's already checked the bathroom and the showers just to give up now that he's actually found Misha. He didn't even need Jared to tell him to run off after Misha and make sure that he's okay—or, well, as okay as he can be, under these seriously fucked up, unsatisfying circumstances.

Except for the problem where Jensen has no idea what to do. Sighing, he rounds the corner to where Misha's sitting on the floor by his locker, shoulders hunched and looking even worse off than he sounds. He's started changing out of his gym uniform—which sits next to him in a heap—but apparently, he gave up once he got his trousers pulled up to his waist. They're unbuttoned and only halfway zipped, and on top of that, Misha's pale, pudgy tummy pooches out over the waistband, into his lap. Jensen really just wants to hug him, but in lieu of that, he slides down the lockers, sits down next to Misha and waits in perfect silence.

"I weigh a hundred pounds more than you do," Misha says after a while, long enough that Jensen starts checking the wall on the clock, just to make sure that they won't miss next period. The bell might not've gone off yet, but they've got Sister Mary Ignatius next and you can't be late to her class, especially not when Misha's in such a vulnerable state. Misha huffs and cards his fingers back through his hair, pouts down at his stomach. "I've got hips like a girl's, and I weigh a hundred pounds more than you do, and incidentally, would you mind it terribly if I kicked your fucking cousin in the head?"

"Well, that sort of depends on which cousin and why," Jensen supposes, leaning his head back against the lockers. "But if it's Jared, then by all means, go ahead and do it. He probably deserves it."

"Oh, he definitely deserves it." For all he says that, Misha still ends up shaking his head. Looking like he's still trying to wake up from a bad dream. "He's been telling me how into me you are for months now, and I keep telling him that he's crazy, and he just keeps saying it and telling me to make a move because you never do… Well, I think we got proof enough that you're not into me today, right? How could you be?"

Furrowing his brow, Jensen blinks up at the ceiling. He's in fucking Bizarro World—that has to be it. He's tripped and fallen somewhere, and he woke up in Bizarro World. But just in case he's in the real world, he reaches over to put his hand on Misha's knee, gives him a gentle squeeze. "Well, if I were going to be into you—I mean, I… If I were going to be into you, it wouldn't just be because you're cute, and if it was, I wouldn't…"

Jensen groans and bangs his head against the lockers. Words suck and this bullshit of trying to make them do what he wants them to is so horribly unfair. "That's not to say that I'm not into you? This is coming out all kinds of wrong, I just… All I'm trying to say here? Is that I really… I just mean. You're smart, and you're funny, and you get so down on yourself sometimes, but I never understand why, because you're really, really _awesome_ , and you look… I think you're cute?"

He's blushing scarlet as he forces himself to look down at Misha, who's gone pale and looks like someone's whanged him upside the head with a two-by-four. Misha's cheeks twinge pink as he whispers, "…Jared's not full of shit about you being into me, is he?"

Jensen shakes his head, mutters that Jared's pretty much spot-on about that, and silently thanks God when Misha's the one who curls a hand up behind Jensen's neck, the one who nudges Jensen down into a kiss. And they hold it until Misha yanks back, spits out, "But what if I don't lose any weight from seeing Coach on Wednesdays?"

Jensen shrugs, curls his hand around Misha's wrist. "You've always looked cute to me, Meesh. You'll always be cute to me."


End file.
